Stoic Inspired Physics

Abstract

According to Aristotle’s demarcation, there are two kinds of science. There are the special sciences characterised by their determined study object. This embraces all traditional sciences including classical physics and axiomatic mathematics. Secondly, the science nowadays called metaphysics, is characterised by its study object having an undetermined genus. In this post, I identify the quantum object as an instance of the fundamental study object of metaphysics.

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Naturality as Universal Normative Authority in Stoic Logic

D.J.H. Moore

Logic Colloquium European Summer Meeting of the Association for Symbolic Logic

Presented 23^rd July 2021 (paper to follow)

Abstract

To be tractable, every science requires first principles. Each special science embarks from a foundation  of axioms, empirical laws, etc., thus employing a rule-based ethic to rationally arrive at consequent knowledge β. The construct can be represented schematically as

            α → β                                                #1

At the other limit we find metaphysics, the only science lacking determined genus and thus devoid of a priori knowledge.  This leads to a right-side rationality schematic:

            Α ← Β                                                  #2

Here, rationality flows in the opposite direction with a priori knowledge Β on the right and the consequent Α on the left.  This schematic no longer illustrates a syllogism but its converse, a cosyllogism (not to be confused with Peirce’s abductions. For that the cosyllogism be tractable, a priori knowledge Β must be formalised in some way. We resort to the only viable normative authority available – naturality.

In mathematics, naturality is colloquially regarded as involving constructs that are free of ad hoc subjective choices. Traditional set theory mathematics is ill-equipped to formalise the ethics of naturality. The alternative is Category Theory originally developed “to study functors and natural transformations”. Natural transformations can be formalised in the form of naturality squares that commute where two sides are left and right adjoints making up “natural” symmetries – arguably the most ubiquitous and fundamental generic structure underlying mathematics.

In this paper, category theory itself will be shown to participate in its own natural symmetry with its own “right adjoint” complementary opposite providing a natural way of formalising the cosyllogistic reasoning in #2.

The paper then goes on to show that the resulting cosyllogistic “right-side” rationality provides a means of reverse engineering the natural rationality underlying the five indemonstrables of ancient Stoic logic.

Keywords: cosyllogism, metaphysics, naturality, adjunctions, Stoic indemonstrables

References:

Bobzien, Suzanne, Stoic Syllogistic, Oxford Studies in Ancient Philosophy, Vol. 14, pp.133-92.1996

To the Stoics, the Cosmos was organised around the incarnate rationality of Logos, following in the tradition of Heraclitus. The rationality of reality is inextricably entwined and expressed by Logos. That’s the cosmic logos and the same principle applies to individual rational beings, the individual logos. The personal and impersonal logoi all share the same principle.

If one is interested in developing the Foundations of Science there is no better place to start than to reach an understanding of the Logos. What is its architecture ad what are its fundamental constituents? That is indeed the objective of my project. [continue reading…]

Despite what some people think, the genetic code did not evolve. It has been unchanged for billions of years. I call it the generic code. Why? Because the code even preceded biological life. There is another kind of lifeform that preceded the emergence of biological life. This prebiological lifeform is none other than the universe we live in. It is an ancient idea: the universe is a living entity. However, there is a difference. Unlike biological lifeforms, the generic material for the universe is not distinct from the material it manages. The genetic and the ordinary all seem to be the same stuff.

If this perspective is accepted, then the four-letter alphabet that encodes biological life should also map to the subatomic particles of matter. The result should be a “periodic table” for subatomic particles.

I am writing this all up. This post is an excerpt. A sneak preview of such a periodic table can be explored in my online database.
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